Mentoring Our Boys –

I just received a newsletter from Sam Mahaffie of Saving Our Boys. I want to share an article from that newsletter. The picture image of this story is powerful.

“In Australia there is a beach where at certain times each year thousands of starfish are washed up shore. Usually at night, at high tide, a large wave will bring them in so far that the water won’t carry them back out. Then, as the sun shines on the star-fish, they slowly dry out and die.

One morning a tourist came out of his hotel for a jog at dawn. Down on the beach he noticed a little boy picking up stranded starfish and throwing them back into the sea. But there were thousands of them up and down the sore.

The man ran up to the boy and said, “I know what you’re doing, and I think I know why you’re doing it. But there are thousands of starfish here and miles of beach. Do you really think that what you are doing is going to make a difference?”
The boy said, “I don’t know. But I think it will make a differ-ence to this one.”

And he picked up another starfish and threw it into the sea.

You know, I think the Lord is searching the land for men like this little boy, men who care enough to reach out to a fatherless boy. That is the only way we can reach them, one at a time.

Boys are being washed up on the shore of life and no one is stopping to reach out to them, to save them from the grip of Satan. In the book, Lost Boys, James Garbarino says that we need to connect our boys to positive values and positive relation-ships. He hit the nail on the head when he wrote that we need to connect children and teenagers to the deeper meanings of life …” to help them answer who they are and what is life all about. It all starts with basic hope for the future.
We have the solid answers to the questions of life and we know where our boys and young men can find hope for the future. The answer is Jesus. If you don’t reach out to that boy washed up on the shore of life, who will?

Reach out, be a mentor, be a prayer partner, do something.

WILL IT MAKE A DIFFERENCE? You bet it will.”

It will make a difference. Find mentoring resources at Squires2Knights.com

Posted on May 14th, 2010 by Jeff Purkiss
Filed under: Rite of Passage